Ministry of Commerce & Industry
Nomination of members to the National Startup Advisory Council
The Central Government has now decided to nominate the non-official members on the National Startup Advisory Council representing various stakeholders such as founders of successful startups, veterans who have grown and scaled companies in India, persons capable of representing interest of investors into startups, persons capable of representing interests of incubators and accelerators, representatives of associations of stakeholders of startups and representatives of industry associations. The nominated non-official members are as follows:-
1. Shri Byju Raveendran, Byju’s
2. Ms. Shradha Sharma, YourStory
3. Ms. Lizzie Chapman, ZestMoney
4. Shri Abhiraj Singh, Urban Company
5. Shri Kunal Bahl, Snapdeal
6. Shri Deepak Garg, Rivigo Service
7. Shri Bhavish Aggarwal, Ola Cab
8. Shri Krishna Kumar, Cropln
9. Shri Sanjeev Bhikchandani, Info Edge India
- Shri Sridhar Vembu, Zoho Corp
- Shri Kris Gopalakrishnan, Axilor Ventures
- Shri Dr Subba Rao Pavuluri, Anath Technologies
- Shri Mohandas Pai, Aarin Capital Partners
- Shri Gopal Srinivasan, TVS Capital Funds Limited
- Shri Ramesh Byrapaneni, Endiya Partners
16. Shri Prashant Prakash, Accel
17. Ms. Vani Kola, Kalaari Capital
18. Shri Manoj Kohli, Softbank India
19. Shri Rajan Anandan, Sequoia Capital India
20. Shri Amitabha Bandyopadhyay SIIC, IIT Kanpur
21. Shri Kunal Upadhayaya, CIIE, IIM Ahmedabad
22. Ms. Renuka Ramnath, Indian Private Equity & VentureCapital Association
23. Shri Venkatesh Shukla,The IndUS Entrepreneurs 
24. Shri Sharad Sharma, Indian Software Product Industry RoundTable .
25. Ms. Debjani Ghosh, National Association of Software and Service Companies 
26. Shri Uday Kotak, Confederation of Indian Industry 
27. Shri Vineet Agarwal, Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM
28. Shri Uday Shankar, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry 
The term of the Non-official members of the Startup Advisory Council shall be for a period of two years or until further orders, whichever is earlier.
Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade  had constituted the ‘National Startup Advisory Council’ vide Notification No.5/2019-Startup India dated 21st January 2020 to advise the Government on measures needed to build a strong ecosystem for nurturing innovation and startups in the country to drive sustainable economic growth and generate large scale employment opportunities. The council shall, inter alia, suggest measures to:
- Foster a culture of innovation amongst citizens and students in particular;
- Promote innovation in all sectors of economy across the country, including semi-urban and rural areas;
- Support creative and innovative ideas through incubation and research and development to transform them into valuable products, processes or solutions to improve productivity and efficiency;
- Create an environment of absorption of innovation in industry;
- Facilitate public organizations to assimilate innovation with a view to improving public service delivery;
- Promote creation, protection and commercialization of intellectual property rights;
- Make it easier to start, operate, grow and exit businesses by reducing regulatory compliances and costs;
- Promote ease of access to capital for startups;
- Incentivize domestic capital for investments into startups;
- Mobilize global capital for investments in Indian startups;
- Keep control of startups with original promoters.
- Provide access to global markets for Indian startups.